So to start off, I was shocked reading some of the previous reviews of people who according to their reviews stayed in the hotel at the same time as us (Christmas/New Year). I’m all for honest reviews and pointing out the flaws in a hotel, but the over exaggeration of some people is ridiculous.

Check In- 5/5

Took no more than 10 minutes. We rung a few days before to check they had our reservation (as it was booked as part of a package with a holiday company) and the lady on the phone said she’d try and get our rooms near each other. When we checked in we found she had arranged interconnecting rooms so we were right next door- nice that she did that.

Staff 4/5

We never encountered any rude staff, they were all more than happy to help us while we were there. Including when I accidentally locked myself out of my room…with the safety latch locked on inside (I’d gone out through the interconnecting door which had also shut). The only thing is the whole ‘island time’ thing, no one is ever in any rush to do anything.

Rooms- 3/5

Yes they are dated and in need a revamp, but both our rooms were clean. The maids came every day apart from one day when they missed one of the rooms- not sure how that happened especially as the interconnecting doors were open that day as well! The shower problems that everyone speaks about are somewhat true. We never had a ‘cold’ shower per say, but at peak times when the pools emptied out (between 5-7pm), the chances of having a hot shower were pretty slim.

Waterpark 4/5

Having done a lot of waterparks in the past (Disney, wet n wild etc), I wasn’t holding out too much hope on the water park here, but I have to say I was pleasantly surprised! We were staying at the Royal for a week over Christmas so we were there at peak time.

Firstly, to debunk one thing, we NEVER had a long wait to get a wristband at any time of the day, there are so many places on the property where you can get one and as a hotel resident there are some places that non guests don’t have access to where you can go to.

Leap of Faith and the Serpent slide (the 2 rides that go through the shark tank) both had the longest lines during the day, I queued for about 30mins for Leap of Faith and 40mins for the Serpent slide. The queues for the rides in the power tower were pretty much non existent, I think the longest I queued was about 15minutes for the surge and Abyss (although sods law whenever I was in the queue for the Surge, there was no queue for Abyss!)

The rapids river was definitely one of the best aspects of the park and had people of all ages on it. Ignore the reviews of people harping on about it been dangerous and throwing people out of their rings. I rode it several times and the only time I saw someone come off their tube was a kid who purposely flipped it over (at the rapids part of the ride the water is barely even knee deep, he ended up sitting on the bottom with his head well clear of the water)

There is also a massive lifeguard presence, most pools have 3 or more lifeguards watching over them and I saw them get in on more than one occasion. They’re also pretty hot on checking people’s height for the water slides, I saw a good few parents trying to argue their kids onto the slides when it was pretty clear to anyone with eyes that they were under the height restriction!

The only real negative for me was the signage was pretty terrible and trying to find the entrances to some of the rides was a nightmare! But other than that I had a really great time here.

FOOD

Okay so this always comes up in peoples reviews. First, 12% tax, its a tax set by the government, not the hotel, so why everyone criticises the hotel over this is beyond me- we paid the same tax when we ate out in Nassau. Yes the service charge is a bit annoying in the quick serve restaurants, but the prices are lower in those places so really it doesn’t make a huge difference.

So the prices- coming from London, and stopping off in Miami before we got to Atlantis, food prices weren’t much of a shock, they were pretty much on par with big city prices. Lunchtime prices were on par with what you’d pay in pretty much any theme/water park you’d go to, and in fairness, every lunchtime meal we had there, even at the quick service, was cooked fresh.

For dinner we ate a mixture of restaurants from their casual to gourmet dining. (Murrays, Bahamian Club, Marina Pizza, Poseidon's, Mosaic). We never had a ‘bad’ meal and the food at the Bahamian Club was SUPERB. Booking wise we aren’t organised people, we didn’t have anything booked before we came, The Bahamian Club was the only restaurant we needed a booking for and we did it on the TV in the room the day before we ate there (Carmines however does book out REALLY far in advance, we asked on the 24th and the next booking they had available was on the 2nd January!)

Breakfast we ate at Plato’s most days, we never queued for more than 5 minutes to get food there and didn’t have any trouble getting a seat either.

So I guess my summary is, food prices here are expensive, but no more so than what you’d pay in London or any other big city I’ve visited. Considering it’s so easy nowadays to look up reviews and menu prices I don’t really understand why there’s so many complaints. At the end of the day, if you don’t want to pay the premium for the food, either 1) Eat off site, it’s not like Atlantis locks you in, there are plenty of restaurants an easy walkable distance from the hotel that you can visit or 2) Don’t go there, choose somewhere that fits your budget.

Casino 4/5

We were hoping that the casino would be a child free refuge, but unfortunately it most definitely isn’t- at least not till much later in the evening. Kids aside though, there’s a tonne of different slots and table games to play and I actually ended up winning- which never happens for me!

Honestly, the thing we disliked the most about this hotel was the people there- and I’m not talking about the staff. There were a lot of families who were more than happy to let their kids run riot and seemed to think it was adorable when their kids screamed the place down and had massive tantrums in the middle of restaurants and other public spaces. I know it’s something that can happen anywhere, but there seemed to be an excessive amount of it going on here.

It’s definitely not a 5 star, but it doesn’t claim to be (at least not in any holiday brochures I saw!), yes it is pricey for what is room wise- a very average 4 star hotel, but most 4 star hotels don’t have a massive water park and aquarium attached to them!

I just booked the Atlantis a week ago for next spring 2021 and I called today to change the dates and was told I booked an employee price for employees only after calling and working with customer service on the website and over the phone to make the booking. And was told I would have to pay the difference upon arrival that they would’ve charged me had I come to the resort with booking that price or I had to rebook it for a More expensive rate. I did not know anything about an employee rate as I worked with someone via the texting on the Atlantis website. I should have been honored the price I booked it for instead of being told “you must have seen it say employee somewhere” and cutting me off as I was talking and then I was hung up on the second I said I might cancel it. This phone call was with a supervisor. She would be fired in any other establishment to do that to a first time customer. If I booked the price online for a certain rate it should be honored whether Atlantis made a mistake or not as that is what I booked it as with help from the Atlantis team. I am currently looking at booking at our second choice at Bahamar. Hopefully they honor the prices their guest are able to book it at online.